A mile is not far to walk, but when it is to be covered on a tightrope slung high above a dam, for most people it might just as well be as far as to Mars, so formidable would the journey seem. Yet the celebrated French tightrope walker, Henry Rechatin, accomplished it in 1965, presumably after years of dedicated practice, at Saint-Étienne in two hours and fifteen minutes.

What is the object of such a feat? Does it have value? We think it does. When one human being achieves something that is generally believed physically impossible, it immediately opens the door of limitation so that others quite soon after do the same— that is to say, they do if they are willing to make the determined mental effort required to develop in themselves the necessary strength and ability to triumph.

And it does require strong effort on the part of humanity to overcome the fears and limitations imposed by finite mortal belief, not only in the area of physical accomplishments but of mental ones as well. Mary Baker Eddy points out in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, "We are all capable of more than we do." ^{Science and Health, p. 89;} But people often accept suggestions of limited ability and capacity too easily. They may not even stop to think before insisting, "Oh, I couldn't do that! I can't speak in public," or, "I am too stupid with figures—I can't even add," or, "Even to look out of a window makes me afraid of falling." They just assume that because they never have, they never will be able to make a speech, to keep accounts, or climb a mountain.

Who or what is it that speaks when these declarations of incompetence are voiced? Not God, and not the son or daughter of God, infinite Mind, in whose image we are all made and should know ourselves to be. It is false mortal belief, the erring personal sense that testifies to man as being a material, physical entity separate from God, a mere speck of dust with little significance or influence in the context of cosmic space.

But this is not the truth of man, God's idea, the manifestation of deific qualities, of whom the Bible says, "Thou hast put all things under his feet." ^{Ps. 8:6;} The man of God, divine, infinite Spirit, has inexhaustible capacities. He is fearlessly conscious and confident of his own God-derived strength, intelligence, freedom, eloquence, dominion. He is endowed with limitless power to express the attributes of Soul—indeed, Mrs. Eddy says, "God expresses in man the infinite idea forever developing itself, broadening and rising higher and higher from a boundless basis." ^{Science and Health, p. 258.} This spiritual fact should be increasingly demonstrated in human experience day by day—and it is in proportion as mortals accept the implications of man's glorious birthright of dominion and then apply themselves to proving them.

This does not mean that one who has never tried to walk a tightrope should impetuously attempt to cross the dam at Saint-Étienne—although, as Christian Science shows, God has given to each one of us the ability to fulfill every right demand. The result might well be similar to the near disaster experienced when Peter tried to walk on the Sea of Galilee with Christ Jesus. The "infinite idea" usually develops gradually to human view as we resolutely determine to prove our dominion in increasing measure —as we master fear and gain faith in our own ability to exercise unerringly the qualities of strength, wisdom, and freedom that everyone truly derives from divine Principle, Love.

Every day brings opportunities to demonstrate more spiritual might and capacity. We progress a little each time we triumph over a suggestion of fear and limitation by bringing forth a God-given quality of true being.

This writer recalls the trepidation with which she climbed the steps of the platform in the school auditorium when, at the age of five, she was required to recite one short poem to a hundred other children. The freezing fear was only partially mastered, but it was a first and important step toward accomplishing what was later to be her work for many years—worldwide public lecturing to thousands. There were to be many more steps of overcoming before personal sense was subdued and God-given dominion sufficiently demonstrated. But without the first step in childhood there would never have been a second, and she might still be paralyzed by the false belief of fear and finite capacity in public speaking.

Christian Science is proclaiming to mankind the infinite strength and capability of real being in God's likeness. It is urging children, and men and women to the oldest generations, to take up the challenge of finite, material sense and to prove a little more each day the freedom and dominion that is their divine right. Truth should be overcoming limitation in every aspect of human existence, and it is already doing so in the experience of anyone who is progressing spiritually—anyone who is rejecting inadequacy as a lie and grasping the glorious facts of man's real identity as God's infinite idea and establishing them. God has indeed "put all things under his feet." Eventually, everyone will prove it.

Naomi Price